Albert Einstein (1879-1955) - photo 1

Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Lot 84
10.07.2024 10:30UTC +00:00
Classic
Starting price
£ 18 000
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
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ID 1249795
Lot 84 | Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Estimate value
£ 18 000 – 25 000
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Autograph scientific calculations, in mathematical notation, with a few words in German, n.p., [January 1952]
15 lines on one page, folio, annotated in pencil at lower right 'Rec'd Jan. [19]52'; with a brief typed commentary on a separate leaf. Provenance: Christie’s 21 May 2014, lot 32; Schøyen Collection, MS 5521.

The quest for unified field theory: an experiment with a tensor in general relativity. The manuscript is described in the accompanying commentary: 'A somewhat unusual "contraction" of the Riemann tensor is performed. Attention is paid to a "divergence" problem and again a new potential function is introduced – well known today, but generally not attributed to Einstein'. The Riemann tensor is a four-index tensor useful in general relativity, playing an important role in specifying the geometrical properties of spacetime.

Einstein devoted the last thirty years of his life to the quest to combine general relativity and Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism into a single physical and mathematical framework which would account for all of the then-known fundamental forces of nature – a ‘unified field theory’. Although his early attempts in the 1920s focused on ‘distant parallelism’, he later concentrated on an approach treating both the metric tensor and the affine connection as fundamental fields, often introducing an element of asymmetry (in variance to the theory of general relativity). Einstein often complained of the heavy mathematical burden imposed by this approach, as demonstrated in the present manuscript.
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
8 King Street, St. James's
SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
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10.07.2024 – 10.07.2024
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